"Pay attention to the world." -- Susan Sontag
 

Tag: autumn

Eriocapitella japonica, the Japanese Anemone (1 of 2)

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From “Begonia and Other Flowering Herbs” in The Garden Flowers of China by H. L. Li:

“The anemone, a perennial free-flowering plant with pink and white flowers, is one of the most desirable herbaceous flowers of the autumn garden. It has a long period of cultivation in China, where it is known as Pai Tou Weng (White-haired Old Man), and is a familiar plant in the autumn garden. The plant was formerly used in medicine for a variety of diseases from rheumatic pain to dysentery.

“The anemones now ornament the Western garden, and these are mostly hybrids of European origin evolved from the Chinese species. Called the Japanese anemone, Anemone japonica, this, like many other garden plants, did not originate in Japan but was first noted by European naturalists in that country in the eighteenth century. These naturalists named many a species japonica that was only Japanese by cultivation but actually Chinese in origin (Bowles and Stearn, 1947).”

From “September’s Farewell” in My Garden in Autumn and Winter by E. A. Bowles:

“Anemone japonica is a plant I should like to grow every known form of, even some of the very double ones, but space forbids, so I have limited myself to a few. It is one of those plants that when first introduced to Britain was treated as a greenhouse plant, and instructions for so growing it may be found in old gardening books, of the date of Mrs. Loudon’s. Also, like so many introductions from China or Japan of that date, it was a garden form that came, a semi-double, crude pink one, still with us, but one of the least desirable. It is only within the last few years that the really wild type has arrived….

“It is a charming plant, perfectly single, of a soft tone of pink, with neat habit, round flowers about two and a half inches across, and one of the best of the many plants that have poured into our gardens lately from the Chinese province of Hupeh. It was at first called Anemone hupehensis, but is now generally regarded as a wild form of A. japonica. I like it as well as any of the larger forms, for it has the look of a species about it, and a wonderful substance in the flowers….

“Then there is the beautiful old white form, formerly known as Honorine Joubert, and a plant one should allow to naturalise itself among shrubs and in cool, half-shaded borders as much as it likes, for it will give nearly three months’ display of its well shaped pure-white flowers, which have the most lovely of golden centres, both for form and colour, of any flower I can think of except Rosa bracteata.”

Hello!

This is the first of two posts with photographs of a plant from Oakland Cemetery that has come to mark the transition between summer and fall for me. I’ve so far encountered two (probable) species on the grounds, one of which (Eriocapitella japonica, formerly named Anemone japonica (among other names)) appears around September, and one (Eriocapitella × hybrida) that’s more likely to start blooming later in October. Since it’s still just barely September, this post includes only Eriocapitella japonica, but I’m sure I’ll hunt down the other species in a few weeks, and may even find some Eriocapitella japonica plants still producing blooms.

Like the Clematis from my own back yard (see Clematis Abundance (1 of 3)), plants in the Eriocapitella genus are members of the Ranunculaceae family, and they carry the distinctive center structure that earned the whole family the common name Buttercup. Coincidentally, one of the Eriocapitella japonica plant’s earliest botanical names was Clematis polypetala, perhaps as an observation that the flowers looked like tiny versions of Clematis blooms. This is of course something I just made up, yet it’s not an unreasonable theory given that Clematis polypetala goes back to the early 18th century and early scientific plant names were often developed around appearance similarities. For my part, I’m just glad I finally learned to spell the name of these delightful plants without having to copy and paste it from another document. And the pronunciation tip I created in last year’s post — see Eriocapitella, or: The Plants Formerly Known as Anemone (1 of 2) — has held up pretty well, which also helps me get the spelling right.

Farewell September!

Thanks for taking a look!

Montevidensis Returns!

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From “Descriptions of Vines” in Landscaping with Vines by Frances Howard:

“Lantana montevidensis (Trailing Lantana, Weeping Lantana): Trailing lantana is a prostrate plant with brittle, twiggy, spreading branches. The leaves are rough and rather dull, but they are almost completely obscured by the wealth of rose-lilac flowers which appear in compact heads and literally cover the foliage. The plant is almost everblooming — from spring, through summer and fall, and even into the winter months in protected locations….

“Trailing lantana is perhaps most effective when planted at the tops of low walls and allowed to cascade over them. It is beautiful in hanging baskets, and may be trained on trellises to provide design patterns. Although the plant is an excellent ground cover, it loses its leaves in even mildly cold areas and is killed to the ground by freezing temperatures. It grows back readily from the roots the following spring, if properly mulched….

“Trailing lantana tolerates cold to central Texas and South Carolina. It grows well in Florida and the Gulf States, the southwestern desert areas, and the warm subtropical regions of California. [It] loses its leaves in cold spells and dies to the ground with frost…. If cut to the ground, the plant will grow back readily the following spring.”

From “Flowering Plants for Color on the Ground” in Color for the Landscape by Mildred E. Mathias:

“Lantana montevidensis (Trailing lantana): This species of lantana has long trailing stems with small leaves and bears clusters of lavender-purple flowers in profusion throughout the entire year. It is considered tender but is sometimes seen in interior valleys in sheltered locations. It stands much drought and neglect and is one of the most satisfactory and ornamental plants for slopes in areas with a favorable climate. It is best in full sun and is attractive when draped over a wall…. For a spectacular bloom over a whole year it is difficult to surpass the bush or trailing lantanas.”

Hello!

Once upon a time in October, I posted a series of photos of a flowering vine I later identified as Lantana montevidensis, which I thought was either new to Oakland Cemetery or had previously been undiscovered by The Photographer. The plant — originally named after one of its native regions, Montevideo in Uruguay — is known for its trailing or weeping habits and its ability to bloom through multiple seasons. Yet I was nevertheless surprised to see that it was still producing flowers on November 16, six weeks after I originally photographed it (see Lantana montevidensis, Weeping or Trailing Lantana) and after we’d had a few days of below-freezing temperatures early in the month.

Compared to its condition in the previous photos, it’s true that the plant now has fewer blossoms, they’re a bit smaller, and some of the vine’s leaves are extra-dark green, likely from frost. Yet the fact that there are blossoms at all, they’re mostly undamaged by the cold, and there are still buds waiting to turn into flowers is quite a demonstration of this plant’s hardiness. Its sunny physical location probably helps, and the stone and brick around it would reflect ambient heat to keep the plant warm when temperatures drop. I’m intrigued to see if it’s resilient enough to continue growing and flowering through the winter, or will flower in those very early spring days when hardy plants like quince, plums, and the first daffodils mark the transition away from winter.

Thanks for taking a look!

Feverfew and Featherfew, or, Tanacetum parthenium (2 of 2)

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From “The Virtuous Plants” in The Origins of Garden Plants by John Fisher:

“Chrysanthemum parthenium, feverfew, was, as its name implies, cultivated as a herb for lowering the temperature, and its strongly aromatic foliage no doubt helped to sustain its image as a herb of considerable efficacy. Its white daisy flower and pale green chrysanth foliage can be detected on the fringes of many walled gardens. Its name is said to have been derived from an incident related in Plutarch’s Life of Pericles during which a man who fell while working on the Parthenon escaped death by grabbing hold of a clump of feverfew.”

From “Border Flowers” in Flowers and their Histories by Alice M. Coats:

“C. parthenium. Feverfew. This plant is generally accepted as a native, though some think that it was introduced by the Romans, on the ground that it is one of a number of trees and herbs whose Anglo-Saxon name is obviously derived from the Latin. In this case, feverfew is said to be a corruption of febrifuge, ‘taken from his force of driving awaie agues’ [according to John Gerard’s Herball.] But it is equally possible that the Romans found the plant already here, and merely brought its properties to notice.

A double variety was brought into gardens at the beginning of the seventeenth century, and was then regarded as ‘peculiar onely to our owne Countrey’. ‘It abounds in Britain’, wrote the Dutch florist Crispin de Pass, in 1614, ‘because it appears to be grown there with skill and industry, and indeed from thence many kinds of flowers composed of a manifold series of petals are first brought into the neighbouring countries.’

Later on, it became popular as a foliage-plant for bedding-out purposes, particularly the golden-leaved variety, C. parthenium aureum. As to its properties, it was held to be ‘a special remedy to helpe those that have taken Opium too liberally… In Italy some use to eat the single kinde among other greene herbes… but especially fried with eggs, and so it wholly loseth his strong and bitter taste.’ It was ‘very good for them that are giddie in the head, or which have the turning called Vertigo… also it is good for such as be melancholike, sad, pensive and without speech’.

It appears on garden lists in various spellings — ‘Double Featherfew’, ‘Double Feaverfew’, and ‘Febrefeu’ are among them — for nearly a handful of centuries…. It was called Parthenium by the early botanists because of a tradition (recounted by Plutarch) that it saved the life of a man who fell from a height — having presumably become ‘giddie in the head’ — during the building of the Parthenon….

The scent is supposed to be particularly distasteful to bees. Varieties of C. parthenium are sometimes listed as Matricarias.”

From “A Stroll” by Selma Meerbaum-Eisinger in Harvest of Blossoms: Poems from a Life Cut Short, edited Irene Silverblatt and Helene Silverblatt:

The fields are merely clods of darkest brown
and here and there a bit of yellow-green,
and little sparrows, silly, fresh, and daring,
are darting over them like raucous children…
And far away the city with its towers,
with houses storming forth, so light and merry,

is like an image from a fairy tale.
The air is quiet, filled with yearning,
so that you wait for sky-blue larks
and want to ride in slender rowboats.

Here stand white asters, white and pure,
and there a head of cabbage, small and young.
They’re like a long forgotten parasol
in the middle of snow covered streets.
A rabbit, running past, cannot believe it….

Hello!

This is the second of two posts with photographs of Tanacetum parthenium — a plant whose common names include Feverfew, Featherfew, Bachelor’s Button, and many others listed here — that I took at Oakland Cemetery in October. The first post is Feverfew and Featherfew, or, Tanacetum parthenium (1 of 2).

Alert readers (like you!) might notice that the two excerpts above — from books published in 1982 and 1971 — refer to the plant as Chrysanthemum parthenium, something that emphasizes what I wrote about in the first post: its current name Tanacetum parthenium is a recent enough change that even contemporary botanical references use the previous name. Those two excerpts also elaborate on the parthenium part of the plant’s name (which has remained constant) with rescue stories, though one might still puzzle about whether “grabbing hold of a clump of feverfew” would have mitigated against gravity.

Thanks for taking a look!